Confession
by CaliforniaStop
Summary: Custis writes a series of incriminating confession-style letters to Morgan. Implied Pendlecest, unrequited Custis/Morgan, etc etc.


_**A/N:**__ Inspired by an idea inside calyxofawildflower's _Epithalamium_, which is a work-in-progress. Also Foxy, if you're reading this (and I hope you are) this is 4 u._

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_Morgan,_

_I tremble as I write this._

_I'm grateful that my own guilt will make these words illegible. I write them for you but they are not for your voracious eyes. I know that I would die if you ever read any of the letters I have written to you – but I must write them. I fear I will go mad if I do not._

_It is early in the morning but I cannot return to my bed. I am far too distressed. You are asleep in the next room. We are separated by one wall, brother, but right now I feel as though you are as far as Pandyssia, across the sea. I wish I could go to you now for comfort, as I used to when we were young, but those days of innocent embraces are over. I know this loss is my fault._

_ I confess that I have gone to your room in the past when I have been unable – (or unwilling?) – to sleep. I have watched you and I have ached to slip into the bed beside you and hold you and feel your heartbeat against mine. Fear of your rejection, this inevitability, has stopped me._

_My heart has grown desperate and dark, Morgan, and I need to remind myself – constantly – that I am sick and that my feelings towards you are abhorrent. I exist in this purgatory with you, living as close as I can with my own flesh and blood and, yet, not close enough. Never close enough. We are together and I know that you love me as your brother but there will always be that last desperate inch between us which cannot and __must never__ be crossed._

_I admit that I dreamt about you tonight. I always dream about you, Morgan. How can I not? We are one soul split between two bodies. When I speak, I hear your voice. When I look to my reflection, I see your face. When I touch myself, lying in the night without you, I feel your hands. Sometimes my senses are so muddled and my heart is so hungry that I am confused about who I am. It is only momentary but it is blissful. To think that, even for a fleeting moment, we are indistinguishable from one another, that we are the same and whole, is perfect happiness for me._

_But I am tormented by the last dream, which feels like a blistering wound on my mind. I feel nauseous remembering what my unconscious mind has shown me tonight. I am mulling it over and over so that I might recount it to you in exacting detail. I need to clear my conscience. Tomorrow, I want to be able to wake up and begin our day as though nothing happened. So, I write this letter in a meagre attempt to alleviate my shame._

_I dreamt that _I_ was _you_, Morgan. I know that I was you because I saw myself, through your eyes. I looked upon myself as I look upon you – as I wish you would look upon me: desirous and hungry and needful. This twisted wish-fulfilment felt as if I puppeted you, and to think that you were not acting of your own accord even in my dreams disturbs me greatly; at the same time I cannot ignore how I watched myself – so desperate for you – receive your affections. I – you – touched myself with your hands as I have always longed to be touched by your hands, gently and sweetly and possessively. I kissed myself with your mouth as I have always longed to be kissed by you, with all the familiar desires of a lover. You were rough, as I made you in my dream, as though you wished to devour me and I am ashamed to say that I relished every animal press of your teeth on my flesh._

_After we broke away, the satisfaction on my face was palpable and I bowed our foreheads together, your hand twisted in my hair, your body pressed against mine, so hot and firm and reassuring; and then I woke, full of desire and shame and horror at what I had made you do. You may think it is nothing, this dream, and – perhaps it is nothing. But its greater meaning does not escape me: you will never look at me or touch me as I want you to. That last desperate inch between us is a barrier, a wall higher and thicker than what separates us now. I am and will always be no more than your brother, the man with whom your relationship was forged in the womb and written, irrevocable, in our shared blood._

_I suppose, in a way, I am grateful that there will always be this impediment. I'm afraid, Morgan, of how intensely I want you, of how intensely I want you to want me. I'm afraid that, if I ever got a hold of what I wanted, I would not be content. I would always long for more, more, __more__. I'm afraid of consuming you entirely but not afraid of being entirely consumed. I know that it is not a path you would want to walk with me and driving you away from me continues to be my greatest and most passionate fear._

_I would rather exist with you in this torment of constant longing and in this masquerade of brotherhood than not exist with you at all. And that, I suppose, is my burden to bear and the compromise that I must accept. Anything else – anything without __you__ – is a life not worth living._

_I do wonder though, in these quiet moments of unwilling solitude, whether you dream about me. We used to share the same dreams as children, do you remember? We used to talk about them; we used to frighten people with our shared, unspoken thoughts, but not anymore. That part of our relationship has been closed off, for reasons I don't understand and which hurt me, immensely. I wonder– do we still share the same dreams? Do you dream about me as I dream about you? Tomorrow, will you wake with our illicit touches and kisses branding your mind as they brand mine? You would never tell me, even if you did. I know that you would be thoroughly disturbed by the dreams, and you would ignore them as I cannot. You would ignore the dreams because you would be ashamed and frightened, as I am of mine. Perhaps that's why we don't talk about them anymore: you would worry about what I would think of you but, by the Void, if only you knew._

_A part of me hopes that you do dream about me, Morgan, if only to reassure me that I am not alone. If only to give me futile hope of your affections._

_Custis_


End file.
